Arbib puts states on notice over affordable housing

Social Housing Minister
Mark Arbib
has threatened to take responsibility for the provision of affordable housing from the states if they do not develop consistent guidelines for private housing providers.

His comments come as the not-for-profit housing sector faces an uphill battle to draw in private funding. Providers complain of red tape from local and state governments and myriad planning regimes in different parts of the country. Senator Arbib also called for an independent panel to be set up to assess proposals by state housing authorities and private providers under one roof – a feature long demanded by private providers.

Senator Arbib said the future of public housing was with the private sector, because it was not financially possible for governments to provide the estimated $24 billion needed for social housing by 2020.

“The future of public housing really is affordable housing," he said yesterday at a conference on affordable housing in Sydney. “If we’re going to draw in new capital to the system, they have to have confidence in the system we’re creating."

He labelled as “absolutely ridiculous" the existing system, under which state governments demand that not-for-profit housing providers set up separate subsidiaries to operate in each state. He said there had to be “only one set of reporting and monitoring obligations" when organisations were operating across state borders. He hoped legislation would be passed by 2012.

“We have encountered some resistance in some quarters in the past about moving to a national system of regulation. What I have been clear about is that if we don't go down the path together the Commonwealth will eventually have to go down it alone."

He said the sector was in the same boat as industry superannuation funds 30 years ago, which “aggressively went into the marketplace" and won funding from the financial sector despite doubts. Not-for-profit housing providers have long complained that state housing authorities are defending poor business models and have double standards for their own projects.

The executive director of the Community Housing Federation of Australia, Carol Croce, said state governments were the regulators and funders of social housing, but were also the key competitors against the not-for-profit sector.